10 Reasons Why Women Read Romance Novels

It’s a stupid question. But if you’re a romance reader you’ve probably been asked it at least once: Why do you read romance novels?

Maybe it was phrased differently:

“Why do you even like them?”

“How can you read those books?”

“Wouldn’t you rather read a real book?”

Sometimes they ask out of honest curiosity. Or maybe it’s suddenly thrown at you by some disdainful stranger on the bus who thinks they have the right to critique your reading choices even though you don’t know them from a hole in the ground. Plus it’s 5 pm on a work day, so you’re trying to decide if scalding their face with your tea is worth both losing your tea and getting arrested for assault.

Well, you could tell that nosy question asker that life is squashing your dreams and you need a little you time in a fictional world where good people are actually rewarded with good lives. Then burst into tears (real or fake, your choice) until they scooch awkwardly down the bench and refuse to make eye contact.

Or you could refer them to this handy-dandy list of responses, complete with visual aids. Simply point them to the relevant examples (which range from honest to honestly-a-little-salty), and get back to your book!

5. Women read romance novels because they like to see women presented on the page as intelligent, capable, and clever. Not sad, two-dimensional, and mostly dead for the sake of some guy’s plot progression or emotional transformation.

6. Women read romance novels because in romances there are no limits to what a woman can do or be—and romances encourage us to dream big. Want to be a princess? You can be a princess AND a talented future epidemiologist (A Princess by Default by Alyssa Cole). Want to swing a sword in Dynastic China? You can wield that blade like a pro (Butterfly Swords by Jeannie Lin).

Contrary to what you might have heard, “escapism” is NOT a dirty word.

7. Women read romances because romance novels are often unapologetically dramatic and sweepingly romantic. As one of the highest earning genres, with a long, distinguished history and a loyal readership, romance has nothing to “prove” to anyone. It can embrace its lineage of emotional fireworks and impassioned declarations with pride.

9. Women read romances because romance is the most optimistic, hopeful genre in the market, to the point where its insistence on happy endings frequently needs to be defended from people who think cynicism is the same as realism.

Jessica Avery: Jessica is a recovering MA student, still trying to find a way to make her trained brain forget some of its rigid academic parameters. Unable to move her study of romance novels to the PhD level she turned instead to blogging about them. Constantly. Until she finds that dream book job she's surfing an administrative desk, and wracking her fingers at the keyboard writing about the books she loves.